Successful modulation of temporoparietal junction activity and stimulus-driven attention by fNIRS-based neurofeedback—A randomized controlled proof-of-concept study

Figures

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  Fig. 1.. Study design.

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  Fig. 2.. Illustration of experimental tasks used for pre-post measurements. The reorienting of attention task (left; adopted from Krall et al., 2016) and the visual perspective-taking task (right; adopted from Symeonidou et al., 2016) were used to measure the effects of the neurofeedback training. [Note that in the perspective-taking task (right), the speech bubbles are only shown for illustration. Auditory instructions were provided to the participants by the director (see text).]

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  Fig. 3.. fNIRS optode arrangement and sensitivity profile for the feedback channel. The feedback channel corresponds to anterior parts of the rTPJ (MNI: x = 56 ± 6.4, y = -49 ± 4.6, z = 18 ± 6.9).

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  Fig. 4.. Real-time fNIRS data processing. Correlation-based signal improvement (CBSI) algorithm (Cui et al., 2010).

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  Fig. 5.. Neurofeedback regulation performance. The first row shows the grand averages of the changes in HbO of the feedback channel for the four neurofeedback training days (sessions). The second row shows box plots of the average feedback performance as assessed by the standardized median change of rTPJ activation averaged over participants for all 12 neurofeedback runs (sessions color-coded) based on the online analysis. The third row shows box plots of the standard deviations of feedback performance as assessed by the standardized median change of right TPJ activation averaged over participants for each run. The regression lines of the linear models are depicted in red. Paired-sample t-tests comparing the last session (run 11 and 12) with the first session (run 1 and 2) revealed significant effects, and the ANOVA over all neurofeedback runs only revealed non-significant time trends in the downregulation group only. No time effect was observed in the upregulation group (see main text).

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  Fig. 6.. Primary behavioral outcomes. Results of the reorienting of attention task (upper panel) and visual perspective-taking task (lower panel). For detailed descriptive statistics, see Table S2. Boxplots show interquartile range ± 1.5 (whiskers). Asterisks denote the significance for the group × time interaction and within-group time effects across task conditions; ***p < 0.001; *p <0.05.

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  Fig. 7.. Strategies as reported by participants for each group.